The Tribune's Curse (5 page)

“One of the dramas concerns the death of Hannibal, the other the deeds of Mucius Scaevola.”

“Those sound like safe, patriotic themes,” I said. “Right now, anything about a foreign war looks like a reference to Caesar or Gabinius or Crassus. What about the comedies? I don’t suppose you have anything that would poke fun at Clodius, do you?”

His smile was a bit strained. “I have to live in this city too, you know.”

“Oh, well, forget it. I suppose the usual satyrs, nymphs, cowardly soldiers, conniving slaves, and cuckolded husbands will do well enough.”

“I have a good one about King Ptolemy of Egypt,” he said. “You know he came here last year, begging for money and support?”

“So I heard. I’ll never understand how the king of the world’s richest nation is always a pauper. But Gabinius put him back on his throne. It’s not about him, is it?” The last thing I wanted to do was spend my money to help out someone else’s reputation. Or even worse, risk making an enemy of a powerful man.

“No, this is about his coming here to beg before the Senate. Only I have him going about from door to door in the poorest parts of town, dressed in rags with a bowl in his hand, followed by a troop of slaves to carry his wine sacks. I’ve contrived a device that lets him drain the wine sacks one after another, right on stage.”

I laughed heartily at the thought. I knew Ptolemy and his feats of wine-drinking were little short of what the actor described. “That sounds good. Go ahead with it. Egyptians are always good
for laughs.” Of course, we thought all foreigners were funny, but I didn’t say that to Publilius, who, as his name attests, came from Syria.

“I recommend the new Aemilian Theater,” Syrus said. “Have you seen it?”

“Not yet,” I admitted. This was built the year before by the same Aemilius Scaurus whose baths I had enjoyed that afternoon. “Is it on the same scale as his new baths?”

“It’s larger than Pompey’s Theater,” Syrus said. “Made of wood, but the decoration is unbelievably lavish, and it hasn’t had time to deteriorate. Besides, Pompey’s was damaged during his triumphal Games. The elephants stampeded and broke a lot of the stonework, and when he had a town burned on stage, the proscenium caught fire. The damage is still visible.”

“Besides,” Messius said, “Pompey’s Theater will remind everyone of Pompey, and it’s topped by a temple to Venus
Genetrix
, and that’ll remind people of Caesar. Go with the Aemilian, and then all you’ll have to worry about is a fire breaking out and cooking half the voters. It’ll hold eighty thousand people.”

“Plus,” Syrus added, “most people won’t have to walk as far. Pompey’s is out on the Campus Martius, while the Aemilian’s right on the river by the Sublician Bridge.”

“I’m sold,” I said. “The Aemilian it is.” About that time the first course arrived, and we applied ourselves to it, and to those that followed. I was forced to admit that perfectly fresh sea fish was a rare treat in Rome, where the catch was usually at least a day old by the time it reached the City. These fish and eels were practically still gasping.

We were tearing into the dessert when there was a commotion in the atrium. A moment later a small knot of men came into the
triclinium
. One of them was none other than Marcus Licinius Crassus. Milo sprang to his feet.

“Consul, welcome! You do my house honor!” He rushed to
the old man’s side and led him to the place of honor with his own hand.

“Nonsense, Praetor Urbanus,” Crassus said, apparently in high good humor. “I’m just making a few calls after dinner with the Pontifical College. We’ve been meeting all day, and I’m bored out of my mind. I can only stay a short while.”

“Stay until you depart for the East. My house is yours,” Milo said, magnanimously. He clapped his hands, and the consul’s place was immediately loaded with sweetmeats and iced wine. If Milo was being more than correct in receiving a consul, Fausta was not. She looked on with a coolness bordering contempt.

For my own part, I was shocked. This was the first close look I’d had of Crassus since returning to Rome, and the deterioration since I had last beheld him was marked. His color was high, but only in the cheeks and nose, and that only from the wine. Otherwise, his complexion was gray and deeply lined. His white hair was falling out in patches, and the cords of his neck stood out beneath his chin wattles like lyre strings. The neck itself was scrawny, and upon it his head wobbled like a ball floating upon agitated water.

“Won’t be long now,” Crassus said. “My legions will drive King Orodes of Parthea and his cowardly, savage horsemen to ground, and we’ll bag the lot! Takes more than arrows to frighten Roman soldiers, eh?”

“Of course, you have our heartiest wishes for a swift victory, Consul,” Milo said warmly, managing to keep his smile intact. Most of us shouted traditional congratulations. Even I managed a weak cheer.

Crassus contrived a lopsided, fatuous smile, as if he’d already won. “I’ll bring Orodes home in golden chains and give Rome such a triumph as will make everyone forget Pompey and Lucullus and all the rest!” He raised his cup, slopping wine over his beringed hand. “Death to the Parthians!”

We returned the toast as if we meant it, covering our embarrassment with a lot of old battle slogans. Crassus seemed satisfied with this and nodded away as a slave dried off his hand.

“Jupiter protect us!” I whispered. “Is this really what we are going to send to command an army?”

“I’m afraid so,” said Messius in a voice as low. “At least, he will if he ever leaves the City.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve heard that a number of influential men have sworn to prevent him from going to join his army when he steps down from office. They say they’ll restrain him by force if need be.”

“I won’t say it’s a bad idea,” I told him, “but I don’t see how they can do that lawfully.”

“People who fear a catastrophe don’t worry much about fine points of law. They may whip up the Plebeian Assembly to stop him by mob action.”

He was speaking of the tribunes, of course. They were the ones who had the greatest influence with that body, and of all the year’s officials, Gallus and Ateius were the most venomously opposed to the Parthian war. This could mean blood on the streets again.

“What about that other one who got the law passed giving Crassus the command? Was it Trebonius?” I asked.

Messius nodded. “He was the only one among the tribunes who was really for the war, but with Crassus’s money and Pompey’s prestige behind him, one was enough. He managed to line up all the other tribunes except the two who’re in the Forum every day. All the rest are a pack of timeservers who’ve spent the year dawdling over the minutiae of Caesar’s agrarian laws and the doings of the land commissioners.” He was referring to one of the burning issues of the day: a series of proposed reforms that were unendingly controversial at the time but are incredibly boring even to think about now.

Crassus chatted with Milo, and the rest of us returned to our small talk. When the dinner was concluded, we strolled about the renovated house, socializing and gossiping. I soon found fat old Lisas by the salt pool, talking with a sturdy-looking young man of soldierly bearing. The genial old pervert greeted me with a welcoming smile.

“Decius Caecilius, my old friend! I’ve just spent the most enjoyable evening speaking with your lovely and most noble wife. Have you met young Caius Cassius?”

“I don’t believe so.” I took the young man’s hand. His direct blue eyes were set in a blocky face of hard planes, burned dark by exposure. He had the thick neck common to wrestlers and to those who train seriously for warfare, developed by wearing a helmet every day from boyhood on.

“The martial young gentleman accompanies Crassus to Parthia,” Lisas said. “I have been telling him what I know of the place and the people.”

“The honorable ambassador warns me not to underestimate the Parthians,” Cassius said. “He says that they are more warlike than we imagine and treacherous in their dealings.” He spoke with an earnestness rare in Romans of his generation. It went well with his soldierly bearing.

“For a people recently settled down from a nomadic existence, they are sophisticated,” Lisas said. “They are cunning in the art of horseback archery, and one should always beware their invitations to parley.”

“I don’t expect that they’ll have any cause to parley except when they surrender,” Cassius said. “The bow hasn’t been made that can send a shaft through a Roman shield, and they can ride around all they like. Sooner or later, they’ll have to come to close quarters to decide the issue, and that’s when we’ll finish them.”

“This is what we all hope,” Lisas said, none too confidently.

“What will be your capacity?” I asked Cassius.

“Military tribune. I was sponsored by Lucullus and confirmed by the Senate.”

Military tribune in those days was a most ambiguous position, a sort of trying-out stage for a young man embarking upon a public career. He might spend the campaign running errands at headquarters. But if he proved promising and capable, he could be granted an important command. All was at the discretion of the general.

“You have my heartiest wishes for a successful and glorious campaign,” I said, with some sincerity. It wasn’t his fault that he was to be commanded by one of the men I most despised.

“I thank you. And now, if you will give me leave, I must go pay my respects to the consul.” He departed, and as he went, I felt cheered to know that we still produced dutiful young men. Because of his later notoriety Cassius’s part in the Parthian war came into question, but as far as I was concerned, any officer who brought himself and his men out of that fiasco alive had my admiration, and I never really lost respect for him.

“An excellent young nobleman,” Lisas said. “One could wish that he had a worthier commander.”

“Don’t tell me you’re against the Parthian war, too,” I said, snagging a full cup from a passing tray.

He shrugged his fat shoulders, and his slaves stood by, alert lest he should topple. “Elimination of Parthia would mean one less threat to Egypt. Were the Roman forces to be commanded by General Pompey, or Gabinius, or even Caesar, busy as that gentleman is, I would have no objection.”

“Surely you don’t object because Crassus is in his dotage?” I said. Ptolemy Auletes remained in power through Roman support, but I suspected that a slightly weaker Rome would be to his liking.

“You are unaware, perhaps, of the consul’s activities when my sovereign master, the most glorious King Ptolemy, was here in
Rome almost from the time you departed until last year?”

I had some vague memory of letters mentioning something at the time, but I had been so diverted by terror for my own life that scandals in the capital interested me very little. “I’m afraid not. Will you tell me?”

“Gladly. When King Ptolemy came almost three years ago to petition the Senate for the restoration of his throne, that august body was at first more than sympathetic in hearing his suit.”

“Support for the House of Ptolemy has been a cornerstone of Roman policy for generations,” I said, pouring on the oil.

“And our esteem for Rome acknowledges few boundaries. Alas, Marcus Licinius Crassus proved to be less than wholehearted in his enthusiasm. Before the Senate, he questioned whether, with so many other military projects already undertaken, Rome should shoulder the burden of a campaign to replace Ptolemy upon the throne.”

“The question was reasonable,” I said. “We are stretched rather thin, militarily speaking.”

“With this I am in full concurrence,” he said smoothly. “However, I fear that Crassus resorted to unscrupulous means to reinforce his argument.”

“Unscrupulous?” Roman politicians of the day were accustomed to employ means to gain their ends that would have shocked Greeks. And that was when they were dealing with their fellow Romans. When foreigners were concerned, few limits were observed.

“In his capacity as augur and
pontifex
, he demanded that the Sibylline Books be consulted.”

This was a droll development even to my jaded sensibilities. “He consulted the old books? That’s only done in national emergencies, or when the gods seem to be dangerously displeased with us—lightning striking a great temple or something like that. I never heard of them being consulted on a foreign-policy decision.”

“Just so. Yet he did exactly that. He claimed to have discovered a passage warning against giving aid to the king of Egypt.”

“A moment,” I said, holding up a forestalling hand. “You say he claimed to have discovered it? I am not an expert on sacerdotal matters, but it is my impression that the keeping and interpretation of the books are entrusted to a college of fifteen priests, the
quinquidecemviri
.”

“And so they are.” He looked morosely down into the depths of his cup. “It seems that Crassus has means to get what he wants.” A polite way of saying that he bribed the priests.

“Oh, well,” I said, “Ptolemy is firmly back on the throne again, thanks to Gabinius.”

“An excellent man. But now Rome is going to have an army in the East commanded by a man who is no friend of the royal house of Egypt.” Meaning that, should Crassus have to call upon Ptolemy for aid, it would be very slow in coming. It was a diplomatic nugget of potential value, and it meant that Lisas was cultivating me in what I hoped was a friendly fashion. I thanked him and went to look for Milo.

I was not as shocked as I should have been. I never regarded the Sibylline Books with any great awe except for their antiquity. They were a foreign import dating from the days of the kings, in extremely antiquated language and couched in the customary obscure double-talk employed by sibyls and seers everywhere. On top of that, the original books had burned in a temple fire many years before, and they had been pieced together by consulting sibyls all over the world, and I had some doubts as to their similarity to the originals. The priesthood was not among the most prestigious.

I was skeptical of the value of sibyls and oracles generally, although most people believed in them implicitly. If you have something to say, why speak in riddles? Still, it was uncommonly brazen effrontery to falsify a sibylline consultation. But who was
more brazen than Crassus? Even as I thought these things, the man himself appeared before me.